Teaching Lab Report

San Diego Participant Feedback

Here is an overview of the overall feedback on the course, 62% of participants rated the course a 7 or higher.

Below I compile participant feedback for all quantifiable questions for each facilitator on the left side of the tab, and qualitative feedback on the right side.

Facilitator Feedback

Adelfa Hegarty

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Adelfa Hegarty
Discussions

Alisha Powers

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Alisha Powers
Excellent
Teachers sharing their thoughts and the presentation was helpful
Many teachers agree we are unhappy with the holes in the curriculum, having to print everything, no homework, no student access to Learnzillion.

Ashmeet Sahni

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Ashmeet Sahni
We had a chance to really look at a lesson.

Bethany Brown

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Bethany Brown
talking to peers about what works
homework suggestions
Great job!
A lot of great discussions.
Nothing
Thank you for focusing on the math!
Learned about effective questioning.
More time in break out rooms.
conversation with other grade level alike teachers, time to read through the IM curriculum
I want more supports mentioned for Special Education in these Learnzillion PDs. Visuals or videos to complement the math lessons would be great. It does not seem to be differentiated for different types of learners.
Breakout rooms to talk with other schools
Learnzillion site there seems to be so much clicking around to find the lesson, I wish the site was more user friendly to find lessons and supports to that lesson more quickly/ easier ways
I liked how we looked at our grade level lesson
Nothing about facilitation skills. She was great.
Well prepared; patient with slow feedback from audience/teacher; clear explanation of tasks; multiple invitations to engage
Nothing the facilitator did wrong. To me, this is such a dry subject and is not easy to engage teachers at the end of a workday. I think more lesson instruction and less philosophy instruction would be more helpful to me as a teacher who is new to embracing teaching math this way.
There is way too much focus on equity, and there is not nearly enough focus on the math. One of our facilitators had absolutely no elementary math experience. It is BORING. This seems like such a waste of time when we could be really diving into the curriculum.
The internet only went down at Sessions, and at PBE it worked!
Everything else. PLEASE focus on the math.
informational
thanks!
focused and clear
Jamboard
information

Callie Herring

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Callie Herring
More time....
Learning more about who we choose to call on when we are soliciting answers from my students.
More time...
Nothing to add.
I have a better understanding of funnel vs focused questions
Nothing to add. Just more time in breakout groups to converse
She was a great facilitator!
Learning how to elicit student thinking and getting a chance to try on being a student
I would not have changed anything
At first I had no clue what I was going to learn today because I didn't participate in the summer learning. Through the training I now understand elicit thinking. Well done.
the pacing and questioning using the activities were spot on to model the questions.
nothing that I can think of
Understanding how we can elicit student thinking.
More time...
In general: If there is an expectation that we complete a task through another site or link, it would be helpful if there is a visual run through via shared screen of the steps to access. This will allow all learning styles to be addressed. Thank you for the wealth of knowledge that has been shared over the last few days :)
The opportunity to engage with facilitators, to ask questions, share our thoughts and to shared lived experiences based within the context of mathematical learning. Sharing and explaining the thought behind the pedagogy, and allowing participants to share with other colleagues in breakout rooms trying things on.
Continue adjusting based on the needs of the participants, and being open shared experiences that have been both positive and negative. Continue immersing participants in problems that our students will be engaged in and challenging us to have an open mind, to think about our learners as successful mathematicians, and to create an philosophy that is inclusive of all and believes ALL learners are mathematicians and to set those philosophies into ACTION on a daily basis. Lastly to continue to challenge participants to self-reflect so there can truly be transformative teaching which our students deserve.
Number talks and diving into effective teaching practices
Having more time to expand on the effective teaching practices
Nice that she allowed those who have been using IM to share their experiences.
Understanding the NCTM Effective practices with the Equity Standard. Great work!

Emily Griffin

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Emily Griffin
Good flow of the lesson

Emily Howard

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Emily Howard
Pace, assignment
0
good job
Structured well, pace was good.
Looking at an actual lesson
Everything
Small Groups
Was confused about the overall goal of the lesson or what the takeaway focus was, took me a little to catch on.
I don't think that teachers need a theoretical breakdown of the program. We just want the curriculum and how to use it.
Presenters were informative.
A faster jump into the curriculum. 5 hours of "what is math' is not needed.
lots of background information
lots of educational jargon
It was good. Just tough venue of zoom.
Looking at lessons
Showing lessons first so we can see where we are going
Very well paced
Pacing - and overview
Towards the end of the day - lots of content to process

Gregory Leap

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Gregory Leap
Practical focus in the unit that we are currently working on. Brainstorming on meaningful questions to ask students.
This was the most useful PD with Teaching Lab that we've had yet.
Thank you for finally listening to our feedback and working with our district math team to help design a PD that meets our needs. Focusing on different types of questions, working in grade level groups to unpack the critical concepts and co-create questions for a current lesson - these were all very useful tasks. I also appreciated that we are focusing on a unit/lessons that we are currently working on so it was very relevant.
For once, I would have liked a little more time to work on the tasks at the end rather than as much time in the beginning just reviewing the same things as usual.
Meeting other 8th grade teachers from a different school.
More work on diving in to Grade Level work to better understand the program.
This session was helpful because it was content specific. I liked the discussion on the importance of learning goals. The ratio of break-out-room time to main-room time was good.
Relevant material.
Diving deeper into the Critical Concepts
maybe a little faster pace
Breakout rooms according to your preferred grade. I teach 3 grades and this was very helpful!
Email follow up work with link.
I'm okay, sometimes you all go pretty fast because you are veteran math teachers and you know where everything thing is on the different math sites.
Knowing that I am not the only one re-learning what I forgot while learning what I don't know.
I enjoyed the breakout sessions. I think they were timed well, not too long or too short
Really enjoying these classes Thank you
Critical concept map and focus questions
nothing
Looking at the math from the Student perspective
Nothing
It was a good lesson. I'm just tired at the end of the day. Also, I find students seem to have a lack of confidence in their abilities. When we help them increase the foundational skill of a unit, they feel more confident and start to enjoy math.
I understood what was going on.
Clearer instructions.
Breakout rooms were either too short or too long. Directions were not always clear. And I've been using and teaching this curriculum for 3 years, I don't understand what I'm supposed to be getting from this professional development. I feel like I'm mostly helping the rest of the people from different schools who are newer to this curriculum when we are in breakout rooms rather than learning anything new myself.
We started and ended on time.
It would be nice if this were more relevant. I feel like what we are learning, I already learned from our district resource teachers/district math department over the last 2+ years. This is probably helpful for teachers new to the curriculum, but I'm not learning anything new which is frustrating. There was a brief mention of culturally relevant teaching, but it was very brief and nothing clear or concrete was given.
I apologize but these trainings have been very repetitive. I have been a part of the SDEM for 3 years now and I have already been through these trainings. I would like to see more about how to make these lessons more culturally relevant.
working with my co-teacher regarding our classes
nothing it went well
It was a good introduction to the material
Clear concise statements about directions - written or verbal
none at this time
It was quick and to the point
not sure at this time
I need more of the nuts and bolts of daily lesson facilitating rather that the reasoning behind how it is equitable.
Seeing good math discussion.
nothing it was perfect
He was nice. not boring.
nothing.
Examples given and the breakout rooms
Time to work with other teachers.
The timing was well done and I did like the breakout rooms. The questions were relevant and helpful to work through.
Respectfully, I didn't feel like I learned anything new.
Everything
Nothing
Great facilitator. Working as a student is always helpful
nothing
Breakout Rooms
technology and dialogue was smooth
the discourse that was promoted in breakouts.
I was satisfied with the session. I would like to get to the meat of the classroom implementation work quicker, if anything.

Hanady Elsayed

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Hanady Elsayed
Looking forward to an upcoming lesson and practicing with team mates.
Collaboration and input on lessons and targeting student needs with thought provoking questions. Identifying possible misperceptions and sharing ideas to afdress
She was great, but didn't know the program Learn Zillion that we use.
Breakout room with my grade level
Knowing more about the LearnZillion platform that we have to use for IM
Break out room conversation regarding preparing for a lesson
Learning about platforms
Hanady is very positive and knowledgeable. Love being in her sessions.
People are exhausted and stretched thin but I think they were engaged.
Continue to incorporate research cases that speak to the inequities in our math spaces.
The act of going into lessons that we are actually going to teach was very valuable. It gave us the opportunity to read questions that were posed and to create a few on our own that we could ask the students as we engage in the learning.
Additional time to process and discuss with whole group our thinking and to see the scope and sequence of what our students learned before us and what's needed to solidify their knowledge and thinking for moving forward to the next grade level.
Everything
More grade level practice. Looking more through IM
I am new to the Teaching Lab and feel very supported here in these PD sessions. Thank you!
Clarity in the approach to questioning so we focus on student understanding.
Looking at upcoming lessons.
Our breakout room in our grade level
More grade level practice looking through IM-there are so many parts to look at, it's exhausting
great session!
discussion about questioning
nothing
More participants to share their thoughts.
Too many questions that I had to answer without any background. I was waiting for some content and it never came. I feel like I gained nothing from this session except for more confusion.
Opening
Needs to be more engaging and give us some content. I am still not sure what the role of lab leaders are.
Good guidance by insructor.
I don'y think you need the techers talking as much as you need the instructor giving us useful strategies. And don't call on random people. It makes them uncomfortable.
pacing
demonstrations and collaboration
I couldn't get to prework
Great job
Learning together
0
Opportunities to work in small breakout rooms. Sharing out other groups' work.
very supportive!
I missed Friday afternoon's session. I did the make-up.
Going through the units was valuable.
I wish I could have attended the live session.
Thanks for setting the participation norms early.
I think the level of involvement from the teachers.
I wasn't sure what we would be going over and there is a lot of language that is new (learnzillion, nearpod, moodle, etc.) that can be confusing.
Great opportunities for discussion.
It seems like you needed more time.
Great conversation
Build in a break
the training was good
the conversation on students with different backgrounds
everything was good
Having important discussions regarding race and equity and math.
I really enjoyed the session but the length of the session was daunting.
It was useful to begin to look at the curriculum and dive into a lesson.
I feel like it took a long time to get to that point. Although the prior information was essential, maybe it could have moved at a faster pace.
Good look at organization of lessons and importance of equity as well as conceptual based learning.
I think it's impoertant to be clear that kids all learn at different paces and the grades above should blame the grades below for deficiencies in a child's learning.
jamboards, asking us to share but not forcing us, I appreciate that
We were mis-informed thinking we were going to jump straight into new curriculum so it was a rough start. However, principal confirmed we weren't expected to start the school year with this and that helped alleviate the stress of soemthing new.
It was very good training
information provided
zoom links
I think that what went well was being supported and given the time to unpack the things presented.
I really enjoyed the session but the length of the session was daunting.
Great Presentation
Clear information
time

Kelsey Wasser

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Kelsey Wasser
The opportunities for grade level collaboration
Thank you for giving us time to work on our grade-level content.
Great training.
Small groups
nothing
Emily Griffin has so much positive energy. She is a wonderful facilitator!
Breakout rooms
Nothing.
Great working with grade team.
Understanding building questions
My preparedness
This was the best session yet! Thank you...
Break Out Room Discussions
Getting paid... I hope the grant money is processed soon
Strong connection to what the teachers are grappling with right now.
It was great!
Great pacing and loved the different ways you asked for participation
Opportunities to work many times with grade level partners
I liked that we were able to work on a lesson that we will actually be teaching soon, that was very helpful.
Perhaps a little more time to collaborate in the breakout rooms.
Breakout rooms
I think more awareness of other grade level standards so we could understand what students needed to already know to help build focus questions.
safe learning environment
The breakout sessions
Maybe an example of quality questioning.
Good session
Time to work
Nothing
everything
I liked that my breakout room was with teachers from my school.
I feel it went a little fast for me because I am not good with computers but I hope next time will be better.
Pacing of presentation
Session was fine. We understand internet issues, we've all had them at some point or another during distance learning. As Pete the Cat would say, It's All Good!
I liked Activity 1 and low stress and the conversation around it.
I stress myself out when asked to respond, thinking I don't have the academic language to share out. I am sure I am feeling like some of the students in my classroom.
Engagement
I think engagement with the Jamboard went well.
I think that doing the training after a day of teaching may have made it challenging for most of us.
Awesome course
Group participation and collaboration
nothing
Great leading and modeling of teacher methods.
Seeing a lesson in action.
Nothing :)
It was a welcoming environment.
My prior knowledge.
The Jam Board breakouts.
This is not a great time because it's hard to focus after a full day of teaching.
Discussion

Kimberly Robertson

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Kimberly Robertson
The break out rooms.
Thanks for your time. You did great with little participation from the panel
Kimberly was great.
More time with lesson plans
Everything
breakout rooms with peers
nothing
Kimberly was great.
more help with actual lessons
Thank you
Breakout rooms
More time
Teacher collaboration

Kelsey Wasser

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Kristen Taylor
Group participation and conversation. Content felt relevant and useful.
I accidentally hit 6-12 when I meant to hit K-5. I am a K-5 teacher. She was very knowledgable and patient.
The breakout room were useful.
Shorter Sessions. :-)
Talking about ideas with my grade level colleague.
A lot to cover in a short amount of time. It was a little stressful.
Good size group
More real world examples
Demonstration of how to teach the warm up.
Maybe pose discussion questions in a more informal way that makes people more comfortable with sharing out in a small group. The content is meaningful and I think that if posed in a different way can result in more conversation.
It all went well. We ended up having a good open communication.
Better understanding of the racial theory presented (more in depth knowledge), background information about today's lesson, as well as a faster paced presentation.
we are already using a curriculum that addresses equity issues. It's aligned to the standards. Coming up our philosophies was not a good use of time. We need to focus on implementing a great curriculum, not proving why ist's a good curriculum.
I think we were a little uncomfortable on the whole group share outs this first time, we may have needed some more community building to get there. Not many people shared.
Writing the purpose statement and discussing it with others. Thinking about the importance of head heart and habits, discussing the enabling conditions for professional learning.
When we got to the "Equity based mathematics teaching practices", the bridge was not strong from what we had just been talking about. We were struggling with the connection and then the prompt and what our HOW and WHY is. I was really confused about what we were supposed to be thinking about there and it felt like we were being guided in a certain direction by the facilitator but I don't think we ever got there. Unfortunately, in our small groups, not everyone was willing to stay focused on the task or seemed motivated to do purposeful work around the task.
opportunity to share out
more time in the breakout rooms
The facilitator was encouraging and provided positive energy to the professional development opportunities.
I was able to connect with other teachers.
A list of contacts would have been useful.
Nice to start to get to know everyone in the group. Looking foward to learning more.
nothing
The presenter was prepared with the materials needed to conduct the session.
Less note - taking scrolling and searching and filling out.
All the information being taught is a bit overwhelming. Too much to learn adequately in a 3 day bootcamp.
When in breakout rooms, sharing similar thoughts about the lessons and being overwhelmed brought me a bit of peace as I was not the only one feeling the same way.
Given a little more time. Maybe extending the days and shortening the time a bit so it's not as overwhelming.
NCTM Effective Teaching Practices
More time to dive into the curriculum
She made the day very engaging.
clear expectations. We got time to dive into some of the curriculum. I learned how to facilitate a number talk.
She was not aware of the group's needs. The material was repetitive for a number of the group and those individuals did not benefit from the training.
The pace.
New material. Time for teaching teams to work together to plan for the coming year.
Today went relatively smoothly, especially compared to yesterday (different facilitator). Facilitator seemed more confident and purposeful.
I really enjoy the Tower of Hanoi activity. And having time to work on it independently.
The afternoon 45 minutes that was spent on "practicing" facilitating an Number Talk was ridiculous. Half of us have been doing these for several years. Others were still trying to understand how to interact with the curriculum. The sample warm ups chosen for us to use seemed very random for people who were unfamiliar with them. More information on the hows or whys might have been helpful. Also, I was hoping that we would be given time to actually dig in to the materials/curriculum and start adapting and tweaking it so that it is more culturally responsive and connecting/relatable for our students. Lastly, will there be any conversation about filling in missing learning gaps from last year? We only taught half of the curriculum to our students. This is going to be an issue.
I have been using the Illustrative curriculum for 3 years in my class now. Seeing as though I was part of the research team that first started this initiative these last few days have felt overwhelmingly repetitive. It would have been helpful to have had two separate trainings one for those who are new to the curriculum and one for the ones who have already implemented this curriculum in their classrooms. It would have also been more beneficial for us to have some help and time to plan with our school sites on how to adjust this curriculum to be more culturally relevant to our students.
Providing the questions in the chat before going into the breakout room was helpful.
It would have been better to use those 40 mins to dive into the curriculum with our site teams to work on how to make it more culturally relevant.
time with our school teams not random people
I liked the Stronger and Clear activity. It gave me a better idea of what it is so I can implement it in my classroom.
Providing time to do some of planning
Pacing.
Going more into depth on the purpose behind practices. Applying teaching methods but also using that to understand at a deeper level the underlying philosophy we need to keep in mind.
It was great
It was amazing. I felt like my thinking mattered. Kristen was so great with the flow, and moving ever so incrementally through each step, getting me closer and closer without making me feel like I was missing a step, or that the class was moving too fast, or too slow.
It was refreshing to get a closer look at the curriculum itself. We did a deep dive into an activity that literally opened up my eyes. I had this epiphany where I was making correlations to the way we teach science in SDUSD. It became clear to me that the two processes were almost identical. Many a-ha moments today.
Nothing!! I loved it. All of the facilitators are top notch! Especially Stephanie... she gave me a set of glasses today to help me see.
Much of the session was stuff we already knew or have already been doing for the last 2 years.
More time to work on lesson planning, thinking about how to use it at our school specific, ideas and thinking that other schools may use that can help our team.
Explanations and breakout rooms
Not enough breaks in between
I felt like there was a disconnect with the Towers of Hanoi lesson. As a student, I was asked to come up with a strategy to solve it in as few moves as possible. We never really determined a solid strategy. Furthermore, it was later revealed that the number of moves required could come from the equation total moves = (2^n)-1 . When shown the formula it was very briefly mentioned that number of moves was growing exponentially and that is where the equation came from. Students were not asked to do any "heavy lifting" to come up with the formula and it actually wasn't even explained how the "teacher" came up with the (2^n)-1. Also, later on during the number talks, somebody gave a wrong answer and the facilitator did not seem to notice and just moved on which would confuse students trying to formulate a solid understanding.
The presenter was well prepared.
I did not seem to understand what was being taught from the Towers of Hanoi lesson.
Loved her - very clear, concise
facilitator was great, enjoyed learning about number talks
More curriculum time
Good discussions in breakout rooms.
I was really hoping to work with the curriculum more since it addresses so much of what is needed in math classrooms.
Too much and too fast. I was confused much of the day.
Slow down
Today was nice to see the curriculem
Lesson time at end was difficult did not have what we need to do it
Much better than yesterday; however, some was really repetitive - the Tower Activity and the WarmUp Practice (8th grade was the exact same and I wish Ms. Taylor's comments about what to focus on in the narrative was mentioned before our 'planning')
Lots of great stuff, especially in the morning
mentioned above
It was OK
The sessions go too long.
talking with colleagues
I personally need way more time with the curriculum and preparing to teach it, since I am brand new to IM
Getting some resources for IM from other teachers
I would love to explore IM on the website and get more information about how to use the curriculum materials.
Examples of routines
I would really like time to plan with my school site. We have been using this curriculum for several years and are already familiar with the routines and structure of the curriculum, most of this is not new learning.

Mary Shaw-Lewis

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Mary Shaw-Lewis
Mary is very positive. She makes the Zoom session more enjoyable.
Teachers having an opportunity to share with each other
More time for teachers to do that
Everything: Organized, knowledgeable, courageous, and enlightening
More time...
Very Responsive. But trying to get too much content into the session. We had amazing conversations and then the content was rushed. Less content, more conversations.
Conversations, facilitator built a trusting space
less content. The content is heavy and this session was at the end of the day. More space for conversation.
Mary was fantastic. She was engaging and kept us on-task even at the end of a long day. She is so positive and energetic.
Everything.
Maybe less material to get through. We got stuck on some conversations but they were great conversations. If there had been less stuff to get through, it might not have felt so rushed at th
Positive interaction between participants
Nothing, it was great!
I enjoyed the conversations we had around the inquiry cycle and how
Nothing, it was great!
It was great
Everything Mary was knowledgeable fun and engaging
Nothing
Mary was lively and engaging throughout our session. Her passion for the work was evident. She allowed multiple opportunities for interactions from participants and modeled many of the strategies and beliefs of the IM curriculum. She provided a safe space to engage.
High levels of participation, challenging us to think deeply about our own beliefs and experiences and align them with how we provide learning experiences for our students. She allowed multiple opportunities to engage in self-reflection while also allowing us to experience the curriculum through participating in an actual activity. She listened intently.
More time :)
the dialogue
can't think of anything
So much great information!
Loved the information about inequities that exhist
More time to talk with colleagues
Super! Friendly, supportive, smart, kind.
using particular justice vocabulary like race, racism, equity. There was a reference to
more white people being quiet to allow space for BIPOC (I include myself in this critique,)
Today was fantastic. Facilitators led a very deep and touchy conversation about race and white supremacy topics in education!
The conversations were very rich!
Discussing biases that affect teaching and student learning.
More dicussion about the curriculumn.
Excellent session. I'm excited about continuing the discussion about race and how the systemic oppression affects the African diaspora.
Everything: Organized, knowledgeable, courageous, and enlightening
More time to discuss the impact of race and white supremacy in curriculum and standards.
Having an open dialogue and a safe environment to have these discussions
Nothing, it was great!
Thanks!
I appreciated the pacing of the session. We kept it moving.
A lot of very big topics were brought up. It's a difficult setting to explore those on a deeper level.
She was great!
A lot of great discussions.
Nothing
Great session
Thank you for a great session. Wonderful facilitator!
Breakout Room Discussions
the discussions were very thought provoking
tech issues with the moodle entry

Sheena Lights

Quantitative

Qualitative

All Responses for Sheena Lights
Timing